Without Mercy (23 page)

Chapter Eleven

Dorothy left Midtown North at seven o’clock, accompanied by Rackman, Olivero, and Dancy. They got into Rackman’s car and headed for Lincoln Center, where the first meeting would take place. Thereafter there’d be meetings at every half hour until ten o’clock, when they’d return to Midtown North and Dorothy would take some more calls.

Rackman parked the car in a lot a few blocks from Lincoln Center, and they split up. Dorothy would go directly to the fountain and wait for the first guy, while Rackman and the other detectives would cover the plaza from different angles. When a fat man in a black raincoat approached Dorothy, they’d swoop in on him and take him into custody.

Rackman’s route took him to Tenth Avenue, and he entered the Lincoln Center complex through the entrance near the Vivian Beaumont Theater on Sixty-seventh Street. He stopped next to the pool in front of the theater and looked at the Henry Moore sculpture in the water, trying to figure out what it was supposed to represent. A kid with a beard was taking a picture of it, and Rackman looked at his watch. It was only seven-fifteen and there was plenty of time, but the first fat man might show up early, and if he was Kowalchuk, Rackman wanted to be ready for him.

He lit a cigarette and walked beside Avery Fisher Hall to the plaza, weaving among the benches and the bushes planted in concrete. He reached the plaza and looked at the fountain in its center. It was thirty yards away and he could see Dorothy sitting at the rim with her legs crossed. Johnny Olivero leaned against a pillar in front of the State Theater in his special
barrio
outfit of jeans, sneakers, a red nylon jacket, and a denim cap turned around backwards. In the corner at the other end of Avery Fisher Hall, Dancy was looking at posters of upcoming concerts while smoking his pipe. He looked like the type of person who attended concerts at Lincoln Center, which in fact he was. Rackman thought Dancy looked least like a cop than any cop he knew.

The square was covered, and Rackman looked at a poster advertising an upcoming performance of Aida. Turning to the plaza, he scanned quickly for a fat man in a black raincoat, but couldn’t spot him yet. It probably was too early. A uniformed member of the Lincoln Center security force zipped by on his three-wheeled scooter, making sure local kids didn’t pick the pockets of the tourists. Jenkins hadn’t notified the security force that there might be a little excitement near the fountain at seven o’clock, because he knew they’d start behaving suspiciously, and that might tip off the Slasher.

Rackman meandered around the plaza, looking at the buildings and hoping he appeared like the other people wandering around. It was a warm sunny day and a lot of people were here, just hanging around or waiting to go into one of the theaters. Rackman touched his blazer jacket where it covered his service revolver. It was loaded and ready to go. He hoped this first guy would be the Slasher, but knew the odds were against it. Maybe the Slasher was too cautious to answer an ad in the
New York Review of Sex.
But maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he was a sucker, and anyway, they had to do something to get him. Nothing else had worked, and this wasn’t the sort of case that was solved by an informant. The Slasher was a loner and somehow they had to draw him out. Rackman remembered the Buffalo Butcher, who’d gotten away with twenty-one murders. The Slasher already had five, and they couldn’t let him get anymore. He’d broken his pattern by killing Doolan and his old girl friend. His next victim could be anybody.

Rackman walked to the fountain and looked at the water gushing into the air. He glanced at Dorothy, their eyes met for a split second, then they looked away again. To Rackman’s left were three Puerto Rican kids listening to a portable radio, and to his right was a scruffy couple in their mid-twenties smooching. He thought of Francie. Oh Lord, what am I going to do about Francie?

He saw the fat man in the black raincoat coming up the steps next to the State Theater.

Olivero had spotted him but Dancy and Dorothy were looking in other directions. The fat man reminded Rackman of Jackie Gleason as he walked toward the fountain, his hands in the pockets of his raincoat and his head hunched down in his collar. His black and white checkered cap was worn with the visor high on his forehead. He didn’t look like he could harm a flea but Jack the Ripper probably looked harmless too.

Olivero was following the fat man across the Plaza, and Dancy had seen him now and was moving toward the fountain too. Dorothy looked directly at the fat man.

Rackman decided that there was no point in letting this guy get too close to Dorothy. He pushed away from the fountain, flicked his cigarette into the air, and walked toward the fat man. He sauntered, with his hands in his pockets and his head toward the ground, heading a few feet to the right of the fat man who was halfway across the plaza now. Olivero and Dancy saw what Rackman was up to and were converging on the fat man too. Rackman glanced up at the fat man and saw that he was looking at the fountain eagerly, unmindful of the NYPD closing in on him.

When Rackman got close to the fat man, he side-stepped in front of him, drew his revolver, and said loudly: “Freeze!”

The fat man blinked in disbelief at the Smith & Wesson .38 pointed at his gut.

Rackman whipped out his shield. “Police! Don’t move a muscle!’’

Olivero came at him from the right. “Put your hands in front of you—quick!”

The fat man blanched as he held out his hands, and Olivero snapped the cuffs on him. Dancy felt for hidden weapons and Rackman looked at his face, but he didn’t look anything like the photo of Kowalchuk.

A crowd was forming around them, and Dorothy joined them.

“What’s going on here?” the fat man asked in a hesitant, high-pitched voice.

“Just do what you’re told and you’ll be all right.”

They marched him across the plaza and into the lobby of the State Theater, where they showed their shields to the security man on duty, an elderly black man.

“We need a room,” Rackman said.

“Right this way.”

The security man led them to the elevator and took them down to the basement, where the security office for the building was. A beefy white man in uniform looked up from his desk as the strange mélange came in.

Rackman showed his shield again. “Police—we want to be alone with this man.”

The beefy man pointed to the door. They entered a small office and made the fat man lean against the wall while they searched him. Olivero took his wallet from his inside suit jacket pocket, then they sat the fat man down. Dancy pulled off the fat man’s cap.

“He don’t look like Kowalchuk to me,” Olivero said.

“Me neither,” agreed Dancy.

“Hey—I haven’t done anything wrong!” bleated the fat man.

“Shut up,” said Rackman, looking into his wallet.

“I wanna call my lawyer!”

“I said shut up.”

Rackman looked through his wallet. A card said his name was Vincent LaGozzi and he lived on East Thirty-third Street. “What do you do for a living, LaGozzi?”

“I work in an office.”

“What office?”

“You’re not gonna get me fired are you?”

“If you’re clean you won’t get fired.”

“What have I done?”

“I asked what office you worked in.”

“An insurance company.”

“Which one?”

“Lincoln Mutual.”

“Where is it?”

“Four twenty-three Lexington Avenue.”

“How long you been working there?”

“Six years.”

“You’d better not be lying, because we’re going to check it out.”

“I’m not lying. Hey—what’s going on here, anyway? It’s not against the law to meet a girl.”

Rackman looked at Dancy. “Call Jenkins and have him send in the backup to get this guy and check out his story.”

Dancy went for the telephone, and LaGozzi looked horrified.

“Are you arresting me?” LaGozzi asked.

“No, we’re just taking you in for questioning.”

“Questioning about what?”

“The Slasher murder case.”

LaGozzi stared at Rackman for a few seconds. “The Slasher murder case?”

Chapter Twelve

A few blocks away, Kowalchuk walked into the West Side YMCA, carrying a shopping bag full of new clothes. He made his way to the office and stood at the counter until a young black man got up from his desk and came over to him.

“Can I help you?” the black man asked. He wore a yellow tee-shirt with
West Side Y
on it, and his name was Charles Garvin.

“How much to use the facilities for a day?” Kowalchuk asked.

Garvin peered at his face for a few seconds. “Five dollars.”

Kowalchuk reached into his pocket and took out five dollars. Garvin wrote him a receipt.

“You know where to go?” Garvin asked.

“No.”

Garvin pointed to the door. “Just go out there and turn right. Follow the signs to the locker room.”

“Thanks.”

Kowalchuk walked out of the office and turned right. Garvin watched him go, and wondered if his imagination was running away with him. The cops from Midtown North had been through the West Side Y twice looking for the Slasher, and they’d shown Garvin his picture. That man looked something like the Slasher except for his beard. He was heavyset and dressed like a bum; that fit the description too. Nah, it couldn’t be him, Garvin thought, returning to his desk.

He resumed going through the tickler file to see which memberships would expire next month. Whistling a tune, he took out the cards and looked through them to make certain the dates were correct. The bearded man’s face floated before him. If I call the cops and it isn’t him I’ll look like an asshole. The guy’ll probably sue me. But the cops said to call if anybody resembling the guy showed up. Garvin was plagued with indecision. He didn’t want to call and have the guy turn out not to be the Slasher, but on the other hand, what if he was the Slasher?

Garvin didn’t know what to do. Oh what the hell, he thought. I might as well call. He picked up his phone and dialed nine-one-one.

“Police Emergency,” said a woman’s voice.

“Hello,” Garvin told her. “I work in the West Side Y and a guy just came in here who looks a little like the Slasher. I don’t know if it’s really him or not, but I thought I’d better call anyway.”

“We’ll check it out,” the woman said. “What’s the address?”

Chapter Thirteen

Patrolmen Arthur Spelling and Jimmie Holmes were cruising down Columbus Avenue when the call came over the radio. “Signal six-eighteen . . . six-eighteen ... A man answering the description of the Slasher has just entered the West Side YMCA on Five West Sixty-third Street. A one-three is requested. Which car responding?’’

“I’ll take it,” said Holmes, sitting in the passenger seat. He’d been with the NYPD for fifteen years and had long black sideburns. Picking up the microphone, he said, “Car two eighty-one responding to the one-three.”

“Thank you, car two eighty-one.”

“Do you think I should put on the siren?” Patrolman Spelling asked Holmes. He wore his brown hair over his ears and had it cut every two weeks by a hair stylist on Lexington Avenue.

“Naw, we don’t want to scare him, but it probably isn’t the Slasher anyway.’’

Spelling pressed down on the accelerator, and the patrol car gathered speed. As they were crossing Sixty-fifth Street, another voice came on the radio, “Car six-sixteen responding to the one-three.”

Holmes looked at Spelling. “That’s Baker, ain’t it?”

“Yeah, Baker and Fitzpatrick I think.” On the second floor of Midtown North, Jenkins sat in his office, drumming his fingers on his desk. He’d just heard the radio call and was wondering whether to drive over to the West Side Y. It was only twelve blocks uptown. What the hell, he thought he’d check it out. He looked at the schedule on his clipboard and saw that Rackman and his bunch would be in front of the Coliseum right now, waiting for another fat guy to hit on Dorothy Owens. The Coliseum was on the way to the Y; he could stop and pick Rackman up, because Rackman had been on this case since the beginning and would want to be in on the action.

Jenkins stood behind his desk and straightened his tie. He tapped his .38 in his belt holster and walked into the outer office, where Detective Donaldson was reading a copy of
Penthouse
magazine.

“I’m going to check out that situation in the Y,” Jenkins told him. “Watch the store until I get back.”

Chapter Fourteen

Kowalchuk stood under the hot jets of water in the shower room of the Y. It was a public shower room and a few other guys were with him.

“Nice tattoo you’ve got there,’’ said one of the guys, who sounded gay. “Looks like you just got it.”

“I did.”

“The scab’s still on it.”

“I know.”

“Where’d you get it?”

Kowalchuk looked at the guy through the steam and mist. He was young and well-muscled with a horse tattooed on his bicep.

“Someplace in Brooklyn,” Kowalchuk said evasively.

“Coney Island?”

“Yeah, but I don’t remember what place. I was a little drunk at the time.”

Kowalchuk turned away from the guy and put his face under the nozzle. He’d trimmed his beard with scissors and a razor before coming into the shower, and he wanted to make sure all the little hairs were out, otherwise they’d be itchy.

He stepped back and let the water run onto his stomach; it felt good to take a nice hot shower. He’d like to stay for another half-hour, but he had to get moving. It wasn’t smart for the Slasher to stay in one place for too long.

He turned off the knobs and stepped out of the shower stall. His big YMCA towel was on the hook, and he lifted it off, plunging his wet beard into it. He walked into the locker room and stopped at the locker he’d taken, twirling the dial on the combination lock. The lock snapped open and he unlatched the door. Inside was the suit he’d bought at Macy’s.

First he put on his new underwear, and then the pants of the suit. He transferred the stuff in his jeans pockets to the pockets of the suit pants, looking surreptitiously around before dropping in the knife. Then he sat on the bench and put on his new stockings and shoes. He’d look like a businessman once he had the whole outfit on. Even the salesman at Macy’s had remarked how distinguished he’d looked. Kowalchuk’s plan was to check into a nice midtown hotel and call one of the whores who advertised in
The New York Review of Sex
that they’d come to your apartment or hotel for fifty dollars. He’d kill her and then move on.